"I spent the summer in Ha Noi, Viet Nam, teaching English. It was the first time I'd been there since I was adopted. It was an exercise in immersion, trying to rediscover an old self, you might say. The orphanage from which I was adopted turned out to be a twenty minute walk from where I stayed over the summer. There were twenty-nine orphans there under the age of five; after age five, orphans are relocated. The paperwork in the orphanage wasn't strong enough to locate me personally. There, I met four social workers, and my conversations with them made me appreciate all the little things in life. They weren't concerned about the things we are concerned about here sometimes: am I going to get the right job? Am I going to get married? They were asking me about clean drinking water, what I eat for dinner, about the friends I go with to see a movie. They saw it almost as a success story, of 'this is a guy who got out of the system and chose to come back and see us again.'
"At the orphanage, I ended up getting to see the kids. And it was the definition of the phrase 'smiling like it's Christmas.' I can't ever forget the joy on their faces. Life was their gift. Two of them clung onto me, playing with my glasses, and they exuded innocence, pure joy. Here, we sweat the small stuff, even though we try not to. But with those kids, I kept telling myself, 'This joy is what life should be like.' It wasn't a case of an American playing with kids from Viet Nam. There were no national demarcations of sorts--just two people kicking a soccer ball. The simplicity of the moment was incredible.
"My parents were the first two to travel to Vietnam and adopt a child after the Viet Nam War. On July 12, 1995, Bill Clinton restored diplomatic relations; two weeks later, on August 3rd, I was adopted.
"When I was growing up, a part of me wondered, 'Is the person I'm supposed to be in Ha Noi?' But this trip taught me that it's not like that. Your experiences make you who you are.
"And I'd had people ask me, too, about my mothers. About if I'd ever wondered who my 'real mom' was. But saying the word 'real' relegates the mother I have now to being less. And I've also been asked why my 'real mom' didn't love me enough. But I don't think that's the right way to look at it. I look at the one mother, who went through nine months of labor. She knew she was going to give me up, left me at the hospital the day I was born, and loved me enough to recognize that she couldn't take care of me. And then I look to another mother, who went to band concerts and spelling bees, who took care of me when I had a fever, who taught me patience and kindness. The one who raised me. So when people ask if I would want to meet my birth mother, I say that I know what I need to know about both of them. Honestly, I'm okay with having two mothers."